


Therapy

by AlexiHollis



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, OT3, actually helpful therapy, conversion therapy tw, people with problems helping each other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-15
Updated: 2019-06-15
Packaged: 2020-05-12 05:25:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19222498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlexiHollis/pseuds/AlexiHollis
Summary: Jasper and Lapis worried their own problems would corrupt Peridot, but they didn't think about the possible skeletons hidden in her own closetORGreen gremlin gets hugs





	1. Chapter 1

Jasper, Lapis and Peridot didn’t make the prettiest picture. And that wasn’t even taking into account that, in the general public, a committed polyamorous relationship wasn’t exactly welcomed with open arms.

  
The trio considered it a downright miracle that they didn’t meet in the height of Jasper’s alcoholism or during the lows of Lapis’ depression. Jasper got her five-year-sobriety chip the day she met Lapis and her six-year-chip when they both met Peridot: a small energetic girl in her mid-twenties already working on a PhD in robotics engineering. The three began dating and a couple months later, Peridot moved into the apartment.

  
…That was when Jasper and Lapis realized Peridot got nightmares. Frequently and not your ordinary, run-of-the-mill nightmares that people got over in a few minutes, but cold sweat, wake-up-screaming, scare-the-hell-out-of-your-girlfriends nightmares. To Peridot’s credit, she tried her hardest to keep it from them: she’d stay up late working to make herself too tired to have them, take Benadryl to act as a sleeping aid, and even avoid foods rumored to cause vivid dreams. However, Lapis was getting concerned with her little girlfriend staying up nearly as late as her, the insomniac, and Peridot didn’t want to admit why she was really staying up so late. Jasper didn’t like having any sort of drug around the house, even something as seemingly harmless as Benadryl. Lapis still claimed Jasper was being overdramatic, but once Peridot learned about why Lapis used to go to therapy, she quickly threw away the medicine. And honestly, Peridot loved cold pizza too much to avoid it. That and chocolate.

  
Luckily for Peridot, her girlfriends took this new revelation in stride. Though, it didn’t take long for them to realize the nightmares were more than Peridot was making them out to be.

* * *

Peridot woke suddenly, screaming and thrashing, scaring the hell out of Jasper before she realized what was happening again. Glancing at the clock on the bedside table, Jasper sighed. Twelve forty-seven. The last time it happened, about two nights ago, it’d been around one thirty. The night before that it had been two. Tonight, she was screaming before Lapis even made it into bed.

  
“Hey, hey, hey,” Jasper whispered, trying to soothe a now sobbing Peridot. She wrapped Peridot in her arms, holding Peridot as tightly as she could without hurting her. “I got you, I got you. Shh, shh, shh. You’re okay. Shh, you’re okay.”

  
Peridot sniffled burying herself further into Jasper, “I’m sorry.”

  
Jasper hated it when she apologized for this. She gently kissed Peridot’s forehead, “You have nothing to be sorry for.”

  
“I keep waking you up.” The sentence was broken up by sniffs and coughs.

  
“I’d rather you wake me up than suffer in silence.” That’d been the long standing rule in the apartment, even before Peridot moved in. It hadn’t taken long before Jasper and Lapis realized it was better to go through bad days together than alone.

  
“B-but you’ve got that thing in the gym early in the morning and this is the third time it’s happened this week-” Jasper recognized Peridot’s usual anxiety creeping through, nearly pushing her back into full blown tears.

  
“You are more important than anything at the gym,” Jasper promised, rubbing circles into Peridot’s back.

  
Peridot blushed crimson, fiddling with the neckline of Jasper’s sleep shirt. After a few moments of silence, Jasper tried an old tactic she’d long since given up on.

  
“Do you wanna talk about it?”

  
The answer was the same as always.

  
“No. It’s stupid.”

  
Jasper really doubted that something that caused Peridot to wake up screaming roughly four times a week could be even remotely considered stupid.

  
“Do you wanna go back to sleep?”

  
Peridot fiddled with her neckline again, “Can we wait for Lapis?”

  
Jasper was about to say no, since she wasn’t sure how long Lapis would be and she knew Peridot wanted to get some research done in the morning, but before she could, the door opened slightly letting in the tiniest sliver of light as a lithe figure slunk through the crack. Figuring she’d save Lapis another night of getting ready for bed in the dark, Jasper turned on the lamp on the bedside table.

  
“Oh!” Lapis jumped slightly at the sudden light. The old oversized shirt Jasper recognized as once belonging to her was covered in paint as well as the faded jeans Lapis was wearing. Before Lapis could ask, Jasper mouthed “nightmare” so Peridot couldn’t see. Realization dawned and Lapis quickly changed into a set of sleep shorts and another of Jasper’s confiscated t-shirts.

  
“Hello, Peridot,” Lapis hummed as she slid into bed, curling around Peridot’s back, despite the younger girl still being enveloped by Jasper.

  
Peridot didn’t say anything, but turned her head to Lapis for a kiss she was quickly granted.

  
“What about me?” Jasper pouted.

  
Lapis rolled her eyes before pecking Jasper’s lips, “There you go, you big baby. Now, can you please turn off the light? I am exhausted.”

  
Jasper flicked the light back off and the three fell asleep.


	2. Chapter 2

That afternoon when Peridot came home from the University she was surprised to find both of her girlfriends sitting at the kitchen table. Everything seemed rather serious, a strange occurrence in their home.

“Hi, guys,” Peridot slowly slipped her coat off, hanging it on the coat rack. She let her backpack slowly fall to the ground, not caring at that moment that Jasper would probably complain. “Is something wrong?”

Jasper sighed, “We need to talk.”

Peridot’s eyes got wide as her heart began to beat faster, “Are you breaking up with me?”

“What?!”

“No, Peridot, of course not.”

“What the hell would give you that stupid idea?!”

“That sort of wording doesn’t exactly fill me with confidence!” Peridot answered Jasper’s shocked questions.

“Oh, sorry,” Jasper apologized.

“Just-Sit down,” Lapis gestured to the empty chair before them.

Peridot sat down in the chair. She’d always hated sitting at this table. Lapis and Jasper had bought it before she moved in, therefore they bought it for giants like themselves. Her feet always swung a couple inches off the ground no matter what way she sat.

“What’s up?” Peridot’s voice was still laced with anxiety.

Lapis stopped Jasper from blurting out the reason, “We’re worried about you.”

“What do you mean? I’m fine.”

“Peri, you obviously know you’ve been having really bad nightmares and they aren’t getting any better. Hell, I’m pretty sure they’re getting worse.” Jasper’s laugh was monotone and devoid of any joy. “And you won’t talk to us about them.”

“So I don’t want to talk about them! What’s the problem with that?”

“The problem,” Lapis tried to appease the aggravated Peridot, “Is that it isn’t healthy.” She looked at Jasper before looking to Peridot once again. “And we think it might be best if you…see someone about it.”

They watched as all the color drained out of Peridot’s face, “What do you mean ‘see someone about it’?”

Jasper bit the bullet, closing her eyes, “We think it might help you to see a therapist.”

Lapis and Jasper had expected a lot of things. They’d expected anger, yelling, lists of reasons why she was fine. They expected some sort of explosion, because this was Peridot: whose small stature only meant that her rage was that much more concentrated. She never did anything halfway, they loved that about her.

Yet her face went carefully blank, completely neutral and a calm, if firm, “Thank you for your concern, but I am fine.”

Jasper looked at Lapis, her worry mounting at a rapid rate, confused by her girlfriend’s out of character behavior, yet even the usually passive girl appeared shocked.

“Peridot,” Lapis spoke slowly, calculating the shorter girl’s reactions, though everything about her seemed to have turned to stone. “You understand our concern though, right? It doesn’t really seem like you’re all right, we just want to-”

“And I understand, but I’m fine.” Peridot interrupted, taking Lapis aback; Peridot never interrupted someone talking, she’d exhausted the fact that she saw it as the pinnacle of disrespect.

Before Jasper could but in, Peridot abruptly stood up from the table, heading to her backpack.

“I have research to do,” she mumbled as she rooted around in her bag. Jasper and Lapis looked at each other, eyes mirroring the other’s concern, reaching critical levels. “I’m going to head to the museum downtown, they have a new NASA exhibit about the Mars Rover and one of the head engineers is in town.” Jasper had already stood from the table, heading towards Peridot while Lapis hovered by the couch, unsure of what to do as she watched her girlfriends. Peridot found her keys, having thrown them carelessly into her bag once she’d entered, and grabbed her jacket off the hook, slipping it on. “My professor said if I say I’m a doctorate student from the university, she might talk to me-” Peridot paused when Jasper leaned against the door, preventing her from leaving.

“Peridot, please talk to us,” Jasper practically begged.

This caused Peridot to stop completely. She knew shutting down, shutting them out, wasn’t fair; they didn’t know _anything_ , she wouldn’t _tell_ them anything. In the end, it always seemed like the best option, given that their problems always seemed larger than her own. She liked helping them, being there for the girls she loved more than life, they didn’t need her childhood issues mixed in with that.

Peridot groaned, the side of her that told her to shove down her problems winning out again, “I’m-”

“Don’t you dare say you’re fine,” Lapis’ voice murmured, cool and collected. Peridot turned to face Lapis, leaning against the wall. Her blue hair formed a curtain around her face while her thin arms hugged her herself, as if keeping her from falling apart. “You _aren’t_ fine and I don’t understand why you can’t just tell us. Do you not trust us?”

“Of course I trust you!” Peridot exclaimed, looking between Jasper and Lapis. God, how did she mess this up so badly? “It’s stupid, okay?! I don’t want to tell you because it is so incredibly stupid and over! It’s done, it can’t hurt me anymore, but for some reason I can’t get over it and, trust me, I doubt the thing that caused it is going to help!”

Lapis and Jasper made eye contact once again before Jasper spoke, “What do you mean what caused it?” Peridot didn’t answer, instead looking down at her converse, one toe scratching at the white plastic of the other. “Have you been in therapy before?”

Peridot sighed a little, closing her eyes, “…kind of.” Looking up at both of them, she nodded towards the couch. “Do you want to…?”

Jasper nodded, moving that way, throwing an arm around Peridot as she passed to guide her towards the couch, giving her shoulder a comforting squeeze. Peridot sat down in the middle, Lapis on her left and Jasper on her right.

And began the sorry tale.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please leave a comment below!!


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